Saints Row: The Third. What Sam & Max should be?

If you've played Saints Row 3,and I know *I* have,you might have noticed some things. Like how cartoonish the violence can be,how nonsensical the story is sometimes,and how,with a little imagination,the whole thing can be turned into something altogether funnier.

Imagine,if you will,Sam & Max in a sandbox style city. They have the DeSoto to drive around in. They can go anywhere in the city they want to. Now imagine instead of a "weapon wheel",you have a "box o' stuff". Imagine going to a crime scene,going into "investigation mode" and looking over stuff in a point and click style hunt for clues. Imagine Max doing a take down on a suspect,cuffing him,and reading him his rights as best as Sam & Max can.

Sam: You have the right to remain silent.
Max: After we break your toes,we'll see if you have the *ability* to remain silent.

Oh,several things about game play would have to be reworked,yes,but the over the top game play style and the potential for wackiness is there. What do you guys think?

As I think about it,the more it seems like a good idea. You have the city,right? And it acts like a back drop to tons of stuff. You can reuse it over and over. And you can release cases as episodic content. Need a new location? Don't feel like driving? Just use the handy map to "auto drive" there and boom,there you go,new area. And you can add to and expand or change the city easily!

Tons of things to do! Stop muggers and 2 bit robbers in exciting take downs,hostage situations,and car chases! Search for clues and helpful items at crime scenes,villain hideouts,and interrogations! Look for alternative means to defeat bad guys in humorous ways. Sure,you can pop a cap in someone's melon,but that's not gonna help you find out what the criminals are up to.

In the end,you'd want non-skill oriented means to stop bad guys. For example,you could just shoot a hostage taker with a well placed head shot. Or you could use the megaphone and try to talk him down or out right bamboozle him. I think the idea has merit.

I don't see it to be honest the point and click style wouldn't make me want to spend 20+ hours in the world. An adventure game really needs a fairly linear plot because really the prospect of using items on other items to solve puzzles isn't that engaging on it's own.

The only thing i would add to the Sam & Max games, was more voilience like you see in the Sam & Max trailer by lucas arts, actully being able to see animations when you throw a safe on some burglar and stuff like that, maybe being able to do funny stuff to ordinary people just walking around.

But again, telltales games have always lacked the animations that 2d games had, like when they fight conroy bumpus the whole getting into a big cloud of dust while fighting lee harvey.

Well,it helps if you've seen game play footage of SR3 to really get what I'm talking about. The game is very silly and over the top. The takedowns alone are reason to start thinking of action games in new ways. They're practically cartoon violence. And when you consider what all has been done with Arkham Batman games,well,it becomes clear that there's very little that can't be done these days.

The point and click angle is for people who either don't like action games or just want to figure out a puzzle rather than just shoot a guy. And some enemies you can't beat with just a pull of the trigger. Take the Soda Poppers (please). They're simply too fast for you to shoot them. Which means catching them with your bare hands is right out too. So what do you do? You use your head and figure it out. And you do have to collect evidence and pick up necessary things to solve the crimes and riddles that plague our 2 adventurous adventurers.

I think the idea has merit,tho. A little work and you can probably mod SR3 to run Season 1 with extra shooting action and comical beat downs.

In the end,you'd want non-skill oriented means to stop bad guys. For example,you could just shoot a hostage taker with a well placed head shot. Or you could use the megaphone and try to talk him down or out right bamboozle him. I think the idea has merit.

This is the part of this idea I really have a problem with. See, if you notice in most open-world "solve this problem how ever you want" games, you've got a character that's basically designed to be molded into whatever you want him to be. That way, no matter how you want to play the game, it doesn't seem out of character, since your play style is the main thing defining the character. Want to shoot that guy? Go for it! Decided to spare him? No problem.

When you start giving people a ton of options in a game like Sam & Max, where the main characters are so heavily established, you run the risk of them doing some really out-of-character things, which makes the game just feel off. I'm not saying it's not possible to make it work, but it seems to me like it could end in disaster for the personalities of these characters we know and love.

That said, I've long wanted to see an open world game that made use of the standard "use this on this" adventure formula. I just think perhaps it's best left to a new franchise.

In the end,you'd want non-skill oriented means to stop bad guys. For example,you could just shoot a hostage taker with a well placed head shot. Or you could use the megaphone and try to talk him down or out right bamboozle him. I think the idea has merit.

I think a Sam & Max game where they actually shot someone, especially lethally, would be off-license. Letting the player shoot people at all would be bad. As fans we've occasionally seen them use their guns in public but it's very very rare or not actually shown (Max may have shot that clown at the circus in the comics, and Max also open fires on what he thinks is a crime taking place outside the office window, but it's actually a movie set, and they open fire when chasing after a purse snatcher, yelling 'hey come back we just want to talk!'), and Steve almost never actually shows if any of those bullets hits anyone. Open world Sam & Max does have some extreme merits -- crashing the DeSoto through the ground floor of every shop across New York like the mall chase in the Blues Brothers is ridiculously appealing -- but it opens up a lot of doors which you'd have to try very hard to keep closed or run the risk of it not feeling like Sam & Max.

Well,that's what I'm getting at. You have to stop thinking in terms of real life "brains spouting out the back of his head in a fine red mist" logic and start thinking of it in "soot covering face,knocked on his backside,birds chirping around his head" cartoon logic. And that sets up a joke nicely.

Sam: "I have to stop using these cheap bullets. They turn into ash before they even hit the target."
Max: "But they're so cheap,it's like we have an unlimited supply!"
Sam: "An excellent argument for the quantity over quality crowd."
Max: "And with your aim,we couldn't afford the lawyer bills if we let you use the good bullets."
Sam: "Also a frugal point."

Hit a civilian with your car? No problem,he's just knocked down with little stars around his head. You still lose points for that,tho. You just gotta take what's there for SR3 and then just apply something similar in the Sam and Max style.

As for opening doors,well,the thing is,with a little thought,you can open the right doors and not the wrong ones. We do have decades of game making experience to work with here.

I don't see it to be honest the point and click style wouldn't make me want to spend 20+ hours in the world. An adventure game really needs a fairly linear plot because really the prospect of using items on other items to solve puzzles isn't that engaging on it's own.

Yeah,Sam and Max are more "boil you alive/pour molten lava over you/explode you with a thermonuclear device" kind of killers.

But see,this is what I'm talking about with the "can't do" attitude. People look at a problem and say "this is impossible!" It's actually very easy. Don't want Sam and Max hitting anyone with their bad old guns? Then treat them like giant noise makers and whenever they shoot at someone,they simply cower in terror for a short while but never actually hit anyone.

You're just taking something that's already there and applying it to open world game play. What's so hard about that? And before you ask me to do it,I already have. If you want the results,I want a design credit and cash up front. Sick of doing this shit for you and not getting anything for my trouble. Already handed you one great idea.

I know this is a bit of an old topic.. but hell, it's on page 1 of the threads, and I thought I'd give some more input considering everyone else has said a lot of the same things, but I see it still didn't really settle in for the person who had the idea.

I've played SR3 and beaten it several times. I love the game and the gameplay, but I can tell you it absolutely isn't what Sam & Max are about at all. They don't go around with hookers, perform drive-bys, and certainly don't go around delivering drugs. The humour is different, the art style is definitely different, the gameplay is completely different.

Even if you were to simply be suggesting the idea of having Sam & Max in an open-sandbox world with whacky weapons and comic mischief (I think the Simpsons tried it), I don't think it would work. For one thing, you're taking a series which has hitherto existed as a specific genre, and thrusting it into something totally new and different. Let's stop and ask ourselves how often this actually works. This isn't just taking something like Metroid, a 2-D action platformer, and making it into an FPS (and I still think the results are debatable). This is essentially going from King's Quest VI to King's Quest VIII, and I think most fans will tell you how well that turned out.

There's also the fact that it will, I guarantee, break the fanbase. Not unlike the Metroid example, you'll end up with people who are drawn in by the new game and can't stand the old games.. even if, should the planets align just right, and the game actually be good. Look at what open-world Sonic games did to their fanbase, for instance, and those didn't even really change genre.

Trust me, I understand where you're coming from. You love the characters of Sam & Max, and you'd love to see them in a setting where you can go gun-totting crazy and do whatever you jolly well want to. ..but that's not what Sam & Max are really about. If anything, I think Sam & Max might work as a platformer, not unlike "Conker's Bad Fur Day", but with without blood and toning down the vulgarity. And that's a pretty big if, I might add.

To be perfectly honest, I'd just be happy with a very long point-and-click adventure not unlike what we already have. I have no problem playing such games for hours upon hours. If I want a different kind of gameplay, I have other kinds of games.

I wouldn't like seeing Sam beating people to on-screen death by pummeling their head with a purple dildo or setting cars on fire. I believe you got the essence of Sam and Max wrong.

Let me explain this way... At one side, there is this idea of being always politically correct, serious, sensible and informative for the good of society and the future of mankind -or future of only the individual who's making the claims at the time, if you're a politician. Meanwhile at OTHER side, the idea of setting people loose of such restricting rules, taboos or laws set by culture, religion and decency, is placed. On this side, people likes fun, entertainment. Some of them do care for people, some sickos don't, but in the end, they like seeing the imagery of violence or like to tarnish some taboos whose existence is questionable to begin with, like nudity, like insulting people out of blue. In a way they TRY to be "edgy" and... "destructive" as much as possible by getting far away from such taboos as they can be. Saints Row is an example to that idea. South Park, Family Guy; all sparks from this idea as well.

Those two sides the edges of the "spectrum of seriousness", and everything in existence falls somewhere in between them, depending on their seriousness or the will of breaking the rules placed on minds. Where is Sam and Max in this scale? I believe Sam and Max is out of borders. The thing I love about Sam and Max the most is that the franchise and the idea behind it resides on a point where not many people likes to stand on; Sam and Max criticizes and parodies BOTH ideas and their relation to each other in a sarcastic and hypocritical demeanor. Sam and Max never picks a side, and instead, tries to show people how wacky everything already is. Sam and Max does not try to BREAK or OBEY the rules, all the characters and all the situations are told with conflicting details. Sam and Max oftenly insult people for being too naive and goody-goodpants, and also insult and even oppose people for trying too hard to be edgy or anarchistic. I believe this idea is shared by Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a story never TRIES to be funny. Ends up BEING funny because it treats wacky ideas for human comprehension very seriously, like it's just everyday occurence.

It's easy to come up with a story with shock value. Just put bare tits, explosions and violence around and try to act like all of it is simply insignificant (it's different than the thing I said above because the idea of violence being awesome is overused compared to anything HGttG introduces to reader). It takes WITS to think out of borders and come up with a completely wacky and out-of-spectrum sense of humor like Sam and Max's.

Take Saints Row 3,replace the lead character with Sam and Max,replace the some what realistic violence with cartoon violence,make the side missions and mini-games into something involving police work with that Sam and Max spin,and there you go. New sandbox Sam and Max game in a huge city to use as a backdrop for tons of new episodes and cases and so on. This isn't rocket science. This is barely caveman science. [snip]

To put a finer point on it,let's look at an example. Dropping a bowling ball on someone's head from a second story window in a cartoon,results in cartoon violence wherein the worst suffered is a headache and some dizziness,maybe unconsciousness. In real life,dropping a bowling ball on someone's head from the second story results in a massive,likely fatal,head injury the subject may never fully recover from in even the best of cases. Same situation,2 different outcomes. Why? One's cartoon violence (no one gets hurt),the other's realistic violence (what really happens when you do stupid things like that).

^You know responding to someone elses criticism doesn't involve calling them an idiot . Instead of saying the same thing in all your responces by rehapping your suggestion that was established in your first post you could adress some other posters arguments instead of just poncing on one detail and making out that the opinion is pointless by only deconstructing one part of their argument.

Me: We should take an open world game like Saints Row 3 and make an open world Sam and Max game. We'd change it so it's all cartoon violence and wacky,zany police style fun,but I think SR3 might be a good place to start learning basic game play mechanics for it.

Some idiot: But Saints Row 3 is all violence and people dying and icky and mean! (hence why I mentioned making changes to the game,like going to cartoon violence instead of realistic violence) And Sam and Max wouldn't do criminal things like run drugs and murder hookers! How could you even suggest this!?! (Which is where the "wacky,zany POLICE style fun" thing comes in as we'd obviously change these things so it fits Sam and Max's style)

Me: RAGE!!!!

Now,if you'd paid attention,you'd realize all the "points" the other person brought up HAVE ALREADY BEEN ADDRESSED IN MY PREVIOUS STATEMENT!!! Ergo,I have to repeat myself because someone didn't get it the first time. And I can only do that so many times before it just seems like they're just being trolls. It's like that old saying. You can lead a fool to knowledge but you can't make him think.

And when I'm shown such basic disrespect,you know,not reading my posts,not bothering to understand what I'm saying,and basically bringing up problems that have already been resolved,it bothers me. It says "I don't care what you say,I'm against it cause I'm just going to assume I understand based on a very general idea of what you said". And you want me to treat such people with respect? When they don't even have the common courtesy of actually reading my posts before spouting off their nonsense? When they insult my intelligence so blatantly when they themselves lack even the most basic understanding of what I'm talking about? I flat out refuse. And up yours for telling me to do so.

If this were a spoken discussion,I wouldn't mind repeating myself so much. As it's all written there,where everyone can see the whole thing,the only excuse is they simply couldn't be bothered. And if you can't be bothered to properly join a discussion,then keep your uninformed opinion to yourself.

You're being awfully rude, and that's just going to make people less inclined to agree with you. The reason some people may not pick up on your "responses" to their statements is because you go off on rants like this that can easily lose the point you're trying to make in your frustration.

Trust me, I know all about getting frustrated and totally missing the point I was trying to address.

If you can't figure out a paragraph,then you shouldn't be responding to this thread. Frankly,at this point,you'd have to prove to me you're not a troll. You want respect,yet you give none. You want polite conversation,yet you're going over the same ground that's already been covered. I've explained this topic exhaustively and you still don't get the simple concept of "take Saints Row 3 and making the changes needed to make it a Sam and Max game".

You know, the whole notion of "you're going over the same ground" that you're accusing us of is the same thing you've been doing yourself.

You take a game that is absolutely nothing like Sam & Max and suggest that there should be a S&M game like that - regardless of any other circumstances - is enough to cause debate. I think at this point you just don't like that people disagree with you, and hey, I know that feeling too.

But hey, if you want someone to attempt to defend your opinion let's go with Metroid Prime. It's a first person Metroid game that feels a lot like a shooter and is totally unlike anything Metroid had done before. So many people were against it or on the fence, but when it came out many were pleasantly surprised how well it worked.

I don't think it actually captured the feel of the series, but that's cause I'm not a fan of the genre it went towards. But that doesn't mean a Sam & Max game in an open world where you can get into a lot of mischief wouldn't work or be a bad idea. I simply think that using Saints Row 3 as the premise for the concept you're trying to push was not the best example to use.

You could've simply said "Sam & Max should have a sandbox game where you go around solving cases or causing general mayhem and chaos" might've been better. I mean, I think most of us know what a sandbox game is, it's just that unfortunately most sandbox games are either terribly violent or western RPGs.

EDIT: Also you're only proving their points by using terms like "idiot", "rage", accusing people of trolling cause they don't agree with you, and using all caps. I think a fair number of people wouldn't have been blamed for thinking YOU were the troll. And considering I've been a member here 2 years more than you, accusing me of being a troll is a pretty shallow argument. It's only digging you in deeper.

This is the part of this idea I really have a problem with. See, if you notice in most open-world "solve this problem how ever you want" games, you've got a character that's basically designed to be molded into whatever you want him to be. That way, no matter how you want to play the game, it doesn't seem out of character, since your play style is the main thing defining the character. Want to shoot that guy? Go for it! Decided to spare him? No problem.

No one has called you and idiot, you are getting way caught up with souch a trivial matter about something that is unlikely to happen.

I remember that, I thought the comment was quite appropriate considering that in an adventure game, particularly Sam & Max, your actions can and will be limited by things the characters will and won't do.

It's called an imagination. You have to have one in order to understand this. SR3 is simply the best example of the kind of wackiness one can accomplish with a sandbox game. I'm saying you just need to take it a little further to get it to where it's Sam and Max levels of wackiness. But when you consider the stories they tell and the horrible things they do to people and how often they will use violence and firearms to achieve their goals,one begins to realize the only reason they don't "just shoot people" is because then you wouldn't need to solve the puzzle.

If they could have,they'd have shot Jurgen. They shot at the Soda Poppers without being aware they *could* dodge the bullet. And they have gone on killing sprees before. I remember one comic where they were basically wading through dead storm troopers in a Star Wars crossover. And I've already gone over how you can substitute cartoon violence for real violence. Hence,non-issue. You can keep beating that horse,but it's not gonna get any more dead.

But let me tell you a story. I was playing SR3 when I found out there was a car surfing mini-game. You just jump on top of one of the cars rolling around and you start the game. And while I was doing this,it occurred to me that Sam and Max car surf all the time. And the more I thought about it,the more it clicked. Most sandbox games star a main character who's in a morel/legal grey area,much like Sam and Max. Most sandbox games have the player doing wild stunts and getting into odd situations,just like Sam and Max. And the one thing most sandbox games don't do is let you play the good guys. So it seems to me with so much in common,yet certain key differences,if done right,Sam and Max would make a great sandbox game with enough fresh material to make it stand out.

Merylnn- personal attacks are NOT tolerated. Discussion is fine, but please refrain from insulting your fellow forum members. Not everyone will agree with you, and that's what makes a discussion. Continuing to be rude to other members (anybody in this thread) will result in an infraction, followed by a two-week ban.

Respect is a 2 way street. They start respecting me and reading my posts and talking about something I haven't already covered,in great detail,I'll at least respect their statements enough to not call them blatant morons. But as each post shows no such comprehension,well,I calls 'em like I sees 'em.

Respect is not a 2 way street. You can be smart and drop the ego, thus any insult thrown towards you (directly or indirectly) becoming futile... or you could continue your behavior and show everybody how important your point of view is behind a 2 week ban.

Judging by your way of thinking, I hope the first option to be more to your liking. Thank you.

It's not about ego,it's about having the common courtesy to simply read what someone bothered to write. I don't type this up for fun. I'm trying to convey an idea here. And I really get tired of repeating myself when it's right there.

Actually,there's tons of things to take from SR3 that'd work well in S&M.

Car surfing,which is where I got the idea for an open world S&M game with tons of mini-games. Just jump on an occupied vehicle and wait til it starts moving,then you can enter car surf mode. Try it out and just try not to think of Sam & Max.

Beating up random thugs. Come on,this is what Sam & Max DO! Why wouldn't they beat up on random street toughs? Just think of it in more cartoony terms.